


The Salt And Pepper Diner

by lookoutforburningbuildings



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: During Canon, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Humor, honestly somebody please stop me, whats new for me is i just kEEP GETTING INTO NEW FANDOMS BEFORE I CAN FINISH MY WIPS, whats new pussycats?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-09
Updated: 2019-01-09
Packaged: 2019-10-07 06:11:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,624
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17360504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lookoutforburningbuildings/pseuds/lookoutforburningbuildings
Summary: What a tale to tell.





	The Salt And Pepper Diner

The tavern they were in had a jukebox. This wasn’t a very uncommon thing to see, the invention being placed in many taverns and inns like this just a few years ago. A lot of people liked them, as expected with advancements of technology, and, of course, there was the occasional person who wanted nothing to do with it. It was fine, however, because it added a nice atmosphere to the area. The soft music in the background, muffled by the conversation the group was having. Just a general chat about where they were going next, the map they’d bought a while back spread across the table. Jester and Beau were doing most of the idea throwing, while the others gave their input.

 

Caleb and Nott were sitting against the booth seat next to each other, barely tuned into the talking, as they usually were. If they had something to say, they’d say it when they got the chance or when somebody asked them. It was just how things worked in this group. They weren’t the planners here. Caleb had his leather-cover journal open in his lap as he scribbled words down on the lined paper while Nott looked over his arm to read what he was writing. Normally, he wouldn’t let anybody see what he wrote down, but she was a friend. She was like family, he trusted her enough. Sometimes, even, when he knew she was watching him write, he would write things that might make her laugh. It was cute to watch, especially when she tried to make up excuses to the others who asked what she was laughing at. Usually, it ended with her punching him in the shoulder, but it was still funny and sweet.

 

The group was so focused on their discussion and journaling that they didn’t notice the music fading out. It stayed silent for a good few minutes, not that many people being in the tavern with them, but after a while, the background silence became annoying. Nobody in the group mentioned anything, except for Nott who muttered a complaint under her breath, catching Caleb’s attention for a small moment, him glancing over to her but not lifting his pen from the page, but nobody else seemed to notice or care. The conversation continued at its normal pace, nothing too eventful happening amongst the group. The topic of where to next died off quickly, instead going off to discuss other things like past experiences and stupid questions that nobody could answer (“It’s like, if I cut my leg of and hit you with it, and I hitting you or kicking you? It’s the exact same concept.” “First of all; no it isn’t. Secondly; where the fuck did you get that question? What kind of people did you hang out with before you met us?”), the map having been taken off the table a while before. 

 

It was a very calm discussion, nothing much happening. That is, until a new song started playing from the jukebox. The first loud notes played from the machine, and the scrawling in Caleb’s journal instantly stopped. His and Nott’s eyes both widened in realization, after taking a slight moment to register what was playing. Nobody else in the group seemed fazed by the sudden change or even the specific song playing, but the two were frozen in place upon hearing it. There was a long stretch of silence between them before they slightly turned their heads towards each other to look vaguely into their eyes. It felt like they had a full conversation within ten seconds. Their heads turned back to where they had originally been facing, managing to keep their composure. Then, Caleb let out a loud and breathy laugh, shoving his face into his hands and resting them on the table. This, in turn, led to Nott bursting out laughing as well.

 

The rest of the group’s conversation dwindled away and their eyes just turned to the two laughing. Nott covered her mouth with her hand, trying her best to silence herself while also punching Caleb in the arm with her free hand. He lifted his head off the table and leaned back against the seat, slightly sliding down under the table. He took one hand away from covering his face and did the same, lightly hitting her shoulder. The two were exchanging quiet “shut up!”s, trying to keep their voices down as to not attract attention from anyone else in the tavern. They’d already gotten their groups focus, they didn’t need any more.

 

Speaking of the others, they all just sat there and kept giving each other confused looks, though some of them were smiling as well, possibly due to the contagiousness of laughter. Beau lifted one hand to the side of her mouth and leaned closer to Fjord sitting next to her and whispered. “What is going on?” He gave her a shrug and a look that practically said what it meant; ‘how do you expect me to know?’. It was quite the odd experience, seeing the two laughing this hard, especially at seemingly nothing. For starters, Caleb  _ never _ laughed (“Did you just tell a joke?” Molly had asked, looking shocked and amazed. There was a moment of silence where everyone present was looking at them both expectantly, hoping to the gods he wasn’t actually as stoic and quiet as he seemed, before Caleb simply responded with “No.”), and Nott was, well, she had a  _ different _ and... _ unique _ sense of humor compared to the others’ (gross, dark humor and jokes that nobody should ever make kind of humor). It felt like a whole two minutes had passed before the two finally stopped laughing, and even then, they were still giggling to themselves and breathing funny. 

 

“What was that about?” Mollymauk asked, moving their arm onto the table to rest their chin on while turning their body to face the two next to them. Something they did when they felt like they were owed a story and didn’t want to say it out loud. Caleb opened his mouth like he was about to start speaking only to start laughing again a short moment later. They flashed a grin, showing off their sharp canines. “I feel like this is going to be a good one.”

 

“Yeah, now I’m curious.” Fjord agreed, crossing his arms over his chest. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen any of you laugh as hard as that.” He said, giving pointed looks to everyone sitting at the table. Jester and Beau both fake scoffed, Beau putting a hand to her chest in mock offense while Jester pouted angrily. “I’m being serious!” He exclaimed, holding his hands up on either side of him for emphasis before dropping them onto the table.

 

“Oookay.” Caleb sighed, hand covering his mouth, like he didn’t want anybody seeing him smile. “That song that just started playing on the jukebox a minute ago is a joke between us.” He said, pointing to Nott, who was crookedly smiling and trying not to start laughing again, with his other hand. “It’s from the story of...quite possibly, the best meal I’ve ever had.” Fjord and Beau raised their eyebrows in interest, and all eyes were now on the two again. “It was...what was it, two months after we met?” He asked, looking back to Nott.

 

“A-ah, yes yes, it was two or three months.” She nodded before looking back to the others. “There was-- we were in this town, I don’t-don’t remember the name of, but there was a, uh, diner-- a tavern. It was called ‘The...Salt and Pepper Diner’?” She said, looking to Caleb for possible corrections, but he just nodded, so she assumed she was right. “It was...well, it wasn’t exactly...the best town, so it-it didn’t have the best taverns.”

 

“It catered to creepy homeless people and criminal teenagers, you can say it.” He said, waving his hand. Beau snorted in the back of her throat, catching the other human’s attention, but she just nodded and let him continue. “But,  _ ja _ , it was a family diner. And we both decided to go in there and see what we could see of the town before we, predictably, got caught doing something.” Jester and Molly both nodded understandingly, but not relatably. “It had...this jukebox there, and it was three songs for one silver.”

 

Nott giggled to herself. “So-so, what we did, was we put in seven silver--” An immediate noise of pure ‘oh no’ fell across the table, making the two start laughing again. “We-we-we put in seven silver and chose twenty...twenty-one plays of T-Tom Jones’ ‘What’s New, Pussycat’.” The moment she finished announcing it, Molly broke down into a small fit of giggling and held their head up in their hand against his forehead. “And we just ordered food and waited.”

 

“So, let me get this straight real quick.” Beau said, grinning madly. “To recap--” Nott and Caleb nodded. “This machine played three songs for one silver.” Another set of nods. “And you put in seven silver.” Again. “And played...probably the worst song ever to be written for jukeboxes in the Dwendalian Empire.” They both nodded again, letting out small laughs. “Okay, just wanted to clarify how fucking amazing that is.”

 

“But that’s not the song that just played!” Jester pointed out, looking back to the jukebox. The two started snickering again, which only confused the tiefling further. “This one was different, it was another song!” She said, furrowing her eyebrows in angry confusion. “Is there more to this story?” She asked, which led to Nott rapidly nodding.

 

“First off, the thing about this song. ‘What’s New, Pussycat’.” Molly started, holding out their pointer finger out to signify for them all to be quiet. “Is that this song is-- When it plays twice in a row, your first thought isn’t that, hey, someone’s playing that song again.” Caleb shook his head, removing his hand from over his mouth to show how much pride there was in his smile. “It’s more that, hey, this is a really long song. I’ve heard this song twice in a row before, I know how this goes.”

 

“Exactly.” Caleb whispered. Molly’s eyes widened for a moment, as if realizing exactly how horrible this idea was. “That’s the point. The third time it plays, you’re thinking that maybe someone’s playing the song again, but the fourth time, it’s just--” He was instantly interrupted by Nott, ready to do a fabulous imitation.

 

“Woah! Someone just played ‘What’s New, Pussycat’ four times!” She said, her cockney accent going a bit stale. Jester giggled and put her bend finger behind her teeth, watching this story unfold before her. “Or, at least, they played it twice and it’s just a really long song!” Caleb nodded, mumbling a ‘thank you’ under his breath for the impersonation. “The fifth time is the kicker.” She says, pointing a finger at nothing for emphasis, making the rest of the table start laughing again. “W-we’re--we’ve been watching the entire diner this whole time, and-and there’s this-- there’s just this one guy, a very big human man who’s just watching his kids-- or who we think might’ve been his kids --just jumping around. And he’s been onto us this-this whole time, he saw us putting the song choices in! His hands are-- he’s shaking and staring down into his drink. And he has this look on his face, like he’s just been to his first day of anger ma-management classes.” Fjord scoffed and rolled his eyes.

 

“ _ Ja _ , he’s watching us, and then the fourth play of the song fades out.” There’s a dramatic pause, everyone watching the two in silence. “It’s dead quiet...and I don’t know if you realize, but this song starts out very subtly; with two very loud noises.” Molly starts cackling again. “And he just screams ‘gods damn it!’, and he just pounds his hands on the table, everything shakes, it’s wonderful.” Fjord mutters something along the lines of ‘fucking sadists’ under his breath as he shakes his head. “But here’s the thing about this story, and a quick message about how much of a genius Nott is.” He says with a quick pat on Nott’s head. “We were punching in the song, and when we got to seven, she just stops me and says ‘hey hey hey, wait...before we drop in another ‘What’s New, Pussycat’...let’s put in one of Tom Jones’ ‘It’s Not Unusual’.’”

 

“Oooooh my fucking  _ gods _ !” Beau immediately shouts, leaning back and holding her hands on both sides of her head while the two next to her just laugh intensely. At this point, Molly just has their head in their hands, slowly shaking it as the story progresses. “That is the most amazing shit I’ve ever heard!” She exclaims, looking back to the two, who just look at each other proudly. “Nott the Brave!” She says, pointing her entire hand at the goblin, making everyone laugh harder.

 

“That was when the afternoon went from good to great!” Caleb said, putting his arm around Nott and pulling her against his shoulder. “After seven ‘What’s New, Pussycat’s in a row!” This sentence makes the others laugh more. “Suddenly…” He waits a moment for everyone to stop laughing and pay full and undivided attention again. “‘It’s Not Unusual’ starts to play. And the sigh of relief that swept across this diner, people were ecstatic!” 

 

“I-It was like they’d just been freed from a-a death sentence!” She said. “It was-- It was like somebody had just told them that the war between Xhorhas and The Empire was over and they no longer had to be afraid of spies!” Molly snorted at that and instantly covered their mouth with their hand, still laughing behind it.

 

“You-you know, for years, scientists have wondered ‘is it possible to make grown men and women and others weep tears of joy by playing Tom Jones’ ‘It’s Not Unusual’?” Beau gave a loud open-mouthed laugh before hitting her head against the table, the wood mostly muffling her laughter. “And the answer is yes...as long as it is preceded by seven ‘What’s New, Pussycat’s.” Fjord rubbed the space between his eyebrows and shook his head, probably in disapproval, but you could never be sure with him. “And on the other hand, when we went back?” Everyone started to laugh again, trying to muffle so that they could hear the rest of this story.

 

“Holy shit.” Nott whispered loudly, her eyes wide as if she was having a flashback to the exact moment. “The song fades out.” There’s another long pause waiting for everyone to quiet down again, but it takes much longer this time before they’re finally calm enough to hear more. “It’s dead quiet.” Molly makes a tiny noise in the back of their throat like they’re struggling to contain their composure. Nott side-eyes them before looking back to the table. She then, very suddenly, imitates the beginning of the song before instantly following it with “People went fucking insane.” That one moment makes everybody fall back into the loud and somewhat painful laughter as before, even Caleb. “No one could handle it! No one could handle it!”

 

“H-Honestly, we were also surrounded by this seemingly indifferent staff.” Caleb said, his voice cracking a few times, but his words making everyone try to quiet down again and listen. “They-they just kept looking to the jukebox and then going back to their work, like ‘ah yes, the same shit as always’.” There was another pause. “After eleven plays of ‘What’s New, Pussycat’, they turned off the jukebox, and that...was the best meal I’ve ever had in my entire life.”

**Author's Note:**

> i would say i'm sorry, but do i look sorry?  
> also u might know me i changed my username (amaltheasshole --> lookoutforburningbuildings) because i also changed my name (hi im percival nice to meet you (and no my new name has nothing to do with cr, i found out about percy de rolo after i chose it lmao))  
> anyways im so in love with critical role and all the characters (season 2 specifically, ive only watched clips of season 1 :/) and would die for all of them


End file.
